Garden, TV, Movies
Garden/Patio
I spent most of Saturday afternoon cleaning out pots of dead plants and dirt (20 something of them - some of them very large) and hauling around bags of dirt. I spent most of Sunday being sore. But the good news is, my patio is mostly cleaned off and looks a lot better and I am ready for a fall garden.
I think I am going to try to grow roses in the three huge clay pots I now have. Any suggestions for varieties of rose I should try? I am a novice rose grower. I do have a rose expert living next door and my dad knows roses, so I will have some help. But I need recs for relatively easy but pretty roses and advice on how to care for them.
TV
Groomer Has It
YAY!!! This was the most awesome reality TV competition ending ever!!! Go Artist!!!
HGTV Design Star
Mwuhahahahahahahaha! Oh, Michael! Thank you for serving up such delicious irony! You want your mommy? For real?! Hahahahahahahaha!
The only rooms I liked were Jennifer’s and Trish’s. (I love Mikey V. And Matt and Stephanie are okay, but their rooms weren’t great.) And I thought Jennifer’s was far and away the best of all of them. I am confused about one thing - Vern told Jennifer he could see her as the next HGTV Design Star, then what’sherface told them all that none of them had Design Star qualities. Um ... way to contradict Vern. Maybe they don’t want to just hand it to Jennifer this early in?
Next Food Network Star
I was so relieved Jeffrey wasn’t cut thanks to Adam’s stupidity. Who would attempt to cook bone-in chicken breasts in less than 45 minutes?
I think I can predict the order from here on out, at least to the top 3: Adam goes next, then Jeffrey. Then probably Shane, though I wouldn’t bet my paycheck on that. Out of Lisa, Shane and Kelsey, I’m not sure who is going to win. I’m leaning towards Lisa, but Kelsey could pull it off as well. I just don’t think Shane suits Bob and Susie, even though he’s excellent and I’d watch his show.
I wish they would do a challenge or two that gave them enough time to do something really cool. I’m tired of the speed cooking.
Movies
I finally watched a couple of the Netflix movies that have been sitting on my “movie shelf” since mid-May. After watching them, I’m fairly certain my subconscious was trying to protect me from the extreme awfulness of both of them. One of them was slightly more awful than the other, but still made me absolutely livid. And they were both RomComs, so. Urm, let’s get on with it, shall we? I’ll start with the slightly less awful one.
Rumor Has It
Summary: What if The Graduate was a true story based on real events that happened to an unnamed family? What if the kid of the daughter found out, thought she might be the daughter of a man the character Benjamin Braddock was based on, discovered she wasn’t his daughter and ... alleged wacky hijinks ensue. A Rom Com starring Jennifer Anniston and Kevin Costner with Shirley MacLaine and Mark Ruffalo in supporting roles.
Before I launch into the awfulness or what made me livid, I should let you know upfront that Shirley MacLlaine is excellent in this movie and that Mark Ruffalo is Mark Ruffalo. That is why it is slightly less awful. The two of them are saddled with the impossible job of making this movie tolerable, and they make a valiant effort (and have the only good dialogue in an otherwise horrible script), but impossible is impossible, so the movie still sucks.
Okay, on to the awfulness: This chick knows the guy’s a sleaze, knows that her mother and grandmother had sex with him and has sex with him anyway! And he’s played by Kevin Costner! :( Ugh. It’s just so incredibly stupid!
The Part that Made Me Livid: She leaves Mark Ruffalo’s character for a character played by Kevin Costner!?! What is wrong with this chick. Ugh!!! That’s completely unforgiveable.
I like Jennifer Anniston, but the only movie I really like her in is Office Space. Of course, that’s such a great movie that it’s hard to beat, but still.
If I think about this much more I’ll get all livid and shouty again, so let’s move on to the really awful one.
The Family Stone
This movie has a great cast, and a potentially fun premise and yet it was so horrible that I could not stop watching it. It’s the first movie I can remember having Trainwreck Syndrome for.
How to describe this horror? For starters, the previews for it are very misleading. There is exactly one scene with wacky, zany slapstick comedy in it, and by the time you get to that you’re so distressed by how completely awful the characters are that you don’t really care that they’ve all slipped in a breakfast casserole. In fact, I was cheering for the breakfast casserole.
I think the audience is supposed to initially hate Sarah Jessica Parker’s snooty, uptight, Type A character and adore all the oh-so-PC Stones, but instead I found myself disliking the whole lot of them (this is the most intolerant bunch of liberals I’ve ever been subjected to), save possibly the two other “outsiders” (played by Claire Danes and Brian White) and possibly Luke Wilson’s Stone-Family Ne’er-do-well son. Craig T. Nelson’s father isn’t particularly odious, but he’s so ineffective he might as well not be there.
Claire Danes comes into the movie about a third of the way in and it is obvious from that point that girlfriend swapping that is supposed to hilariously resolve everything. Instead it leaves you scratching your head and wondering why people this twisted aren’t funnier, or more appealing. Judging by the reviews on Netflix, the over-the-top PCness seems to be annoying not just to conservatives but to even the most die-hard liberals and the whole gay-deaf-brother-with-a-black-boyfriend thing is the epitome of it. And all of the above doesn’t really capture the awfulness of it all, so I’m going to quote a review on the IMDB:
“Watching this film was like shooting yourself in the head, having the spurting blood spell out "The Family Stone" in drippy writing, and then having to carry on living in complete agony and brain-deadness.”
Seriously. It is that bad.
I don’t hate Rom Coms. In fact, there are several I like. But the ones I’ve seen lately are starting to push me in the direction of hating them. I have two more to watch sitting on my shelf at home, Cake and Monster-in-Law. I think I’m going to like the latter, but probably not enough to overcome the feeling of pure loathing I have for what I watched this weekend.
I have switched my queue around so that after I’m done with the Rom Coms I mostly have fun silly comedies and kidflicks to get me through the summer, including some fairly recent ones. I thought switching it around like that might help me get back to watching.
I spent most of Saturday afternoon cleaning out pots of dead plants and dirt (20 something of them - some of them very large) and hauling around bags of dirt. I spent most of Sunday being sore. But the good news is, my patio is mostly cleaned off and looks a lot better and I am ready for a fall garden.
I think I am going to try to grow roses in the three huge clay pots I now have. Any suggestions for varieties of rose I should try? I am a novice rose grower. I do have a rose expert living next door and my dad knows roses, so I will have some help. But I need recs for relatively easy but pretty roses and advice on how to care for them.
TV
Groomer Has It
YAY!!! This was the most awesome reality TV competition ending ever!!! Go Artist!!!
HGTV Design Star
Mwuhahahahahahahaha! Oh, Michael! Thank you for serving up such delicious irony! You want your mommy? For real?! Hahahahahahahaha!
The only rooms I liked were Jennifer’s and Trish’s. (I love Mikey V. And Matt and Stephanie are okay, but their rooms weren’t great.) And I thought Jennifer’s was far and away the best of all of them. I am confused about one thing - Vern told Jennifer he could see her as the next HGTV Design Star, then what’sherface told them all that none of them had Design Star qualities. Um ... way to contradict Vern. Maybe they don’t want to just hand it to Jennifer this early in?
Next Food Network Star
I was so relieved Jeffrey wasn’t cut thanks to Adam’s stupidity. Who would attempt to cook bone-in chicken breasts in less than 45 minutes?
I think I can predict the order from here on out, at least to the top 3: Adam goes next, then Jeffrey. Then probably Shane, though I wouldn’t bet my paycheck on that. Out of Lisa, Shane and Kelsey, I’m not sure who is going to win. I’m leaning towards Lisa, but Kelsey could pull it off as well. I just don’t think Shane suits Bob and Susie, even though he’s excellent and I’d watch his show.
I wish they would do a challenge or two that gave them enough time to do something really cool. I’m tired of the speed cooking.
Movies
I finally watched a couple of the Netflix movies that have been sitting on my “movie shelf” since mid-May. After watching them, I’m fairly certain my subconscious was trying to protect me from the extreme awfulness of both of them. One of them was slightly more awful than the other, but still made me absolutely livid. And they were both RomComs, so. Urm, let’s get on with it, shall we? I’ll start with the slightly less awful one.
Rumor Has It
Summary: What if The Graduate was a true story based on real events that happened to an unnamed family? What if the kid of the daughter found out, thought she might be the daughter of a man the character Benjamin Braddock was based on, discovered she wasn’t his daughter and ... alleged wacky hijinks ensue. A Rom Com starring Jennifer Anniston and Kevin Costner with Shirley MacLaine and Mark Ruffalo in supporting roles.
Before I launch into the awfulness or what made me livid, I should let you know upfront that Shirley MacLlaine is excellent in this movie and that Mark Ruffalo is Mark Ruffalo. That is why it is slightly less awful. The two of them are saddled with the impossible job of making this movie tolerable, and they make a valiant effort (and have the only good dialogue in an otherwise horrible script), but impossible is impossible, so the movie still sucks.
Okay, on to the awfulness: This chick knows the guy’s a sleaze, knows that her mother and grandmother had sex with him and has sex with him anyway! And he’s played by Kevin Costner! :( Ugh. It’s just so incredibly stupid!
The Part that Made Me Livid: She leaves Mark Ruffalo’s character for a character played by Kevin Costner!?! What is wrong with this chick. Ugh!!! That’s completely unforgiveable.
I like Jennifer Anniston, but the only movie I really like her in is Office Space. Of course, that’s such a great movie that it’s hard to beat, but still.
If I think about this much more I’ll get all livid and shouty again, so let’s move on to the really awful one.
The Family Stone
This movie has a great cast, and a potentially fun premise and yet it was so horrible that I could not stop watching it. It’s the first movie I can remember having Trainwreck Syndrome for.
How to describe this horror? For starters, the previews for it are very misleading. There is exactly one scene with wacky, zany slapstick comedy in it, and by the time you get to that you’re so distressed by how completely awful the characters are that you don’t really care that they’ve all slipped in a breakfast casserole. In fact, I was cheering for the breakfast casserole.
I think the audience is supposed to initially hate Sarah Jessica Parker’s snooty, uptight, Type A character and adore all the oh-so-PC Stones, but instead I found myself disliking the whole lot of them (this is the most intolerant bunch of liberals I’ve ever been subjected to), save possibly the two other “outsiders” (played by Claire Danes and Brian White) and possibly Luke Wilson’s Stone-Family Ne’er-do-well son. Craig T. Nelson’s father isn’t particularly odious, but he’s so ineffective he might as well not be there.
Claire Danes comes into the movie about a third of the way in and it is obvious from that point that girlfriend swapping that is supposed to hilariously resolve everything. Instead it leaves you scratching your head and wondering why people this twisted aren’t funnier, or more appealing. Judging by the reviews on Netflix, the over-the-top PCness seems to be annoying not just to conservatives but to even the most die-hard liberals and the whole gay-deaf-brother-with-a-black-boyfriend thing is the epitome of it. And all of the above doesn’t really capture the awfulness of it all, so I’m going to quote a review on the IMDB:
“Watching this film was like shooting yourself in the head, having the spurting blood spell out "The Family Stone" in drippy writing, and then having to carry on living in complete agony and brain-deadness.”
Seriously. It is that bad.
I don’t hate Rom Coms. In fact, there are several I like. But the ones I’ve seen lately are starting to push me in the direction of hating them. I have two more to watch sitting on my shelf at home, Cake and Monster-in-Law. I think I’m going to like the latter, but probably not enough to overcome the feeling of pure loathing I have for what I watched this weekend.
I have switched my queue around so that after I’m done with the Rom Coms I mostly have fun silly comedies and kidflicks to get me through the summer, including some fairly recent ones. I thought switching it around like that might help me get back to watching.